(This post is a basic discussion on PK laws, and how certain of them,
and their applications, could make things interesting for Mark members.
If you're not mark, and reading about such a concept might offend you,
skip this post)



I have recently, through my dealings with assorted people, come across a
rather interesting thing.

As you all probably well know, most mark members join the mark simply to
be able to prey on other people. Some join for higher ideals, the
thought of righting wrongs, or seeking revenge for a percieved slight,
or similar, but many join simply for the chance to kill people legally
through a contract, and be absolved of all responsibility of said
contract.

This is all fine and good. However, it has engendered some rather
unpleasant occurences, wherein someone without PK will hire a mark on
someone they have reason to dislike. Probably the most extreme case of
this was the noted incident a number of years back, wherein a novice no
one had heard of hired Proficy on a number of prominent Shallamese,
without cause on any of them. Proficy, as a mark, was completely immune
to IC repurcussions of such, even though it was clear that the situation
developed solely to benefit him. Similar things have happened on a
regular basis for quite some time, if not quite as extreme.

So, what, then, can any of this mean to a Mark member? Well, I've come
to an interesting realization. Since most Mark members do not try and
ascertain the legality of the contracts they accept, instead knowing
they are immune to any repurcussions of an illegal kill, it means that
most Mark members have -no clue- as to whether a contract is legal or
illegal.

What this means, is, if someone chooses to assist (note: Assist, not
defend) someone a mark member is attacking, the mark members -can not-
respond to it at that time, if ever. If they attack someone right after
that someone has assisted, they run the risk of illegally attacking
someone (since assisting someone who is being attacked without cause
grants no PK to the attacker), which is issuable. To be able to attack
the assister, with any certain that doing so is legal, they -have- to
find out whether the contract was taken out legally or not in itself.


Meaning, in summary, if a mark accepts an illegal contract, they can not
touch someone assisting, to do so leaves them open to issue, so they run
the very real risk of not fulfilling the contract, since -any- form of
assistance can occur, be it delivering, yanking, vortexing, lusting,
whatever. And if a mark does not check to see if contracts are legal or
not, they can not safely attack -any- assister. So it behooves a mark
member to check the legality of every contract, and to only accept the
illegal ones they are -certain- they can fulfill, even with assist
attempts, since if they fail, they tarnish their record, as well as give
the person the contract is on a reason to attack them, which is always
annoying when one tries to bash. (Since, interestingly, if a mark has an
illegal contract, then the person the contract is on can run up to them
at any time, attack them, get delivered/portalled/whatevered out, and
the mark can do -nothing- about it)

Penned by my hand on the 20th of Chronos, in the year 395 AF.